Street Photographer...Not a Terrorist

Avotius said:
sure they do, im not saying china is better then america, although I have to say that a lot of people really dont care about all the "issues" american worry about. Why? Its none of their bussiness, if they cant do anything about it then dont do anything about it. Its annoying and logical, which has been funny living here the last two years after growing up in america.

I'm hip. In Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, freedom ranks way far down after feeding oneself, getting roof over head, etc. I know also that all this 'freedom' this and 'liberty' that strikes people who don't live in the USA (and even some who do) as pretty strange. But it was the diet I was raised on - I always think of things in terms of individual liberties, not how does this help society?

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks
 
Rick, I think your answer to the cop was allright. It was truthfull and on the point. Why should you lie to a policeman?
 
Rick Waldroup said:
I saw Bill's thread yesterday about the incident in White Plains NY about the photographer being hasseled while shooting photos of the courthouse. Let me tell you about an incident that happened to me a about a month ago that had not so much to do with me shooting, as it did with me being stopped and detained for a short while because of a t-shirt I was wearing.

I shoot a lot in the downtown areas of Dallas and Ft. Worth. Since 9-11 I have been stopped three different times by police officers inquiring as to what I was taking photos of. Each time I explained that I am a street shooter and I provided ID and each time I was sent on my way with a "Have a nice day". No problems. I did not like being stopped but I understood their concern.

A couple of months ago I bought a goofy t-shirt from a web site- the t-shirt reads "Street Photographer...Not a Terrorist". One day I wore it while shooting in downtown Ft. Worth. I was standing in front of the courthouse shooting away when a police officer approached me on foot and asked me what was on my shirt. I showed it to him and he burst out laughing. He thought it was funny, just as I did when I purchased it. He then asked me about my Bessas and it turned out he was an avid photographer.

A week later I was wearing the same shirt in downtown Dallas and was standing on a street corner shooting some scenes of the lunchtime crowd when a squad car pulled up beside me and the one of the two officers motioned me over. I went over and he looked at my shirt and asked me in a completely sarcastic and confrontational tone of voice if I thought my shirt was funny. At this point, this is where I did not exercise good judgement and I asked him in the same tone of voice "Yes. Do you?" Well, that was all it took. He got out of the car, demanded ID. His partner then got out and while the first one was running the ID check started asking what I was taking photos of. Anyway, after about 5 minutes, another squad car pulled up and all together I was detained only for about 25 minutes. They finally let me go and the original officer who stopped me told me to "watch what I was taking pictures of".

Now, what to make of all this? I posted this story on a photo website based in Texas and for the most part I was roundly criticized for what happened. A lot of folks told me I got what I deserved for wearing such a stupid shirt, etc. And they may be right to a certain extent. And I certainly did not help matters in the way that I responded to the officer's question. But my basic premise is this and I stand by it 100%- I was initially stopped for one reason and one reason only- a police officer was offended by a shirt I was wearing. It was only after I made the smart-ass remark did anyone ask about the photos I was taking.

This is not to rant against the police at all. Theirs is a job I could never do. Who knows, maybe the officer was having a bad day and then again, maybe he is just a bad cop- who knows? Did he exceed his authority- I think he did but others have disagreed with me. I think we now live in a state of fear in this country. When is enough...enough? I will end this by saying that my father brought me up to respect law and order and authority. He also brought me up to just never bow down and indescriminately kiss authority's ass either.

Rick,

Is this the T shirt?
27347007_F_tn.jpg
27347007_240x240_B.jpg

source: http://www.cafepress.com/b2pix.27347007

Check out THIS THREAD

One of Krasnaya_Zvezda's friends is a detective in the Internal Affairs dept. of the Dallas Police Dept.. Maybe you should report this incident.

R.J.
 
If life here in the US is so friggin' crummy why do we have 13 million undocumented aliens and millions behind them trying to get in?

And to my good friends up north - stop reading the T.O. Star or the Globe and Mail and you'll come back to your senses.

Jeez - and to think that it was our soldiers who just risked their lives to free your "Christian" activists in Baghdad!
 
Don't tell me what to read George. BTW you might want to read a bit more about the activists and remember Ken Taylor? Give it a rest. Please

copake_ham said:
If life here in the US is so friggin' crummy why do we have 13 million undocumented aliens and millions behind them trying to get in?

And to my good friends up north - stop reading the T.O. Star or the Globe and Mail and you'll come back to your senses.

Jeez - and to think that it was our soldiers who just risked their lives to free your "Christian" activists in Baghdad!
 
Andy K said:
@ Bill... All of which is why I have not visited since August 2001. You think it's bad for you? Try being a foreign visitor coming through customs, being fingerprinted like a common criminal, having to remove your shoes etc.

Just to add the side note that I have to remove my shoes to fly from Phoenix to LA...and my people ain't been ferrigners for a whole generation.
 
Yeah, I feel your pain, Whenever I go I'm told my shoes have steelshanks. Bull. I have gone without a belt on, the smallest leastmetallic watch. No camera. And still I get "wanded" at most airportvisits.

Meanwhile Boris and Natasha have snuck through a "Hushaboom Bomb." 🙂
 
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Lets see- I was 12 miles from the Pentagon smelling the stench ofburning building and Jet A. Wondering If my town was going to make itthrough.

Wondering if my neice still worked in the WTC.

What you're the only person who experienced 9/11?
 
jan normandale said:
Don't tell me what to read George. BTW you might want to read a bit more about the activists and remember Ken Taylor? Give it a rest. Please

Hey Jan, no problem.

How about we close the border? 😛

I'm all for it (despite my good friends up that a way). 😎

You folks have been whining about NAFTA since the beginning of time. You consider us a bunch of fascists etc. And you keep carping about this darned "softwood lumber" as if we're supposed to accept that some Queen of England is allow to violate fair market pricing by declaring it Crown Lands!

Oh, and BTW, you have engaged in biochemical warfare by sending us mad cows!

You claim we're a bunch of capitalist yahoos because we don't have national health insurance yet come down here to "skip the lines" when you need/want quick treatments.

Oh, and don't give me any crap about oil - you charge us market price - it's not like you're doing us any "favours" (that crazy "our" spelling!). Criminy, Chavez in Venuzuela yells at us too - but still sells us oil at market! Why do we need to hear your carping?

Yeah, I think we should shut down the border. Build a giant wall just like the yahoos in our Congress want to do with Mexico. :bang:

Oh, and cough up the Blue Jays please. No way there should be any MLB team up there! It's our game (even if you did beat us once in the WBC!). 😀
 
Fedzilla_Bob said:
George be careful- someone else might invite you to "dance" and you'll be whining about how you were threatened.

I hear you - but OMG maybe I ate one of those Canuk mad cows? 😱 😀

Actually, I have a number of good CDN friends - and we enjoy our banter etc.

I am actually quite "liberal" but don't enjoy seeing this kind of crap here.

Read the title of this thread: " Street Photographer...Not a Terrorist"

BS if anyone says this is NOT political.

I spend the majority of my time in one of the most congested urban areas on the planet (Manhattan in NYC) and I want to live SAFE! And if out of town folks find my desire for safety too uncomfortable for them to visit - then stay the hell home!

I am really weary of hearing people living in Podunk places that have never experienced mass terrorist killing preaching about how horrible the police are for placing security foremost!

We had 3000 killed in NYC for the simple reason that they went to work one day.

I was one of the lucky ones I was still on the street when the first plane hit - if the bastards had hit a half hour later they would have killed almost 40,000 of us!

We have no dearth of tourists visiting us in NYC these days, and most of them are shooting their snapshots with abandon - so I guess things aren't so friggin' horrible here!
 
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